Written by Dr. Katie Holt and Sofia Denkovski
Finishing the season with a full house
We had a full house when Katie Holt arrived at Punta Tombo on February 8th, but we fit everyone! For one week, Chloe, Sofia, Anna, Katie, Sonia de Berry, and Dee Boersma all stayed and worked under one roof.
Katie’s arrival was just past the peak fledging period—the time when the highest number of chicks leave the colony to head out to the ocean and begin feeding on their own. This season’s peak occurred on January 28, when 34 chicks left the colony in the first hour of our work day.
With peak fledgling already passed and the time for molting upon us, Sofia and Katie got to see the influx of adults back into the colony.
The main priorities we successfully completed to wrap up the season were:
- to monitor all our study chicks until they fledge,
- to tag 60 juvenile birds so we can evaluate their body condition this season, and track their survival over time,
- to deploy satellite tags on adult birds to study their foraging trips before they begin molting,
- and to recover the rest of our tracking devices!
As a fun pilot project, Katie also set up cameras at the weighbridges to test whether we can use machine learning to determine the sex of birds as they cross the scales.
We were fortunate enough to conclude this season with some incredible wildlife sightings.
Wildlife sightings at Punta Tombo
Because it was an unusually dry season, many animals gathered at a small, reliable puddle formed by nearby water tanks at the start of the tourist trail. One morning, we were lucky enough to spot a typically elusive gato montés stopping by for a drink.
Another morning out at Red Rocks, one of our main survey sites on the beach, we observed freshly molted adults foraging right off shore! It was so close that we could see the shimmering scales of the small forage fish as they were chased by the penguins. A few minutes later a Southern giant petrel swooped down and tried to catch some of the more vulnerable molting penguins. Most interestingly, it was deterred by what could only be described as a swarm of adults braying and lunging at him. What a sight to wrap up the season!
More BookYear 2025 updates
Want to learn more about our latest field season at Punta Tombo? Be sure to keep up with the rest of our field updates on the blog.
